The quality of social interactions in young girls with nomophobia syndrome

Abstract

ObjectiveNomophobia, as a growing phenomenon, has gradually affected the quality of social interactions and people's communication and has had considerable consequences on the quality of their real-world relationships. The present study aimed to identify the quality of social interactions and the factors underlying their formation based on the experiences of girls with nomophobia syndrome. MethodsThis qualitative study was conducted using the grounded theory approach. The participants were 20 girls with nomophobia symptoms, who were selected through purposive sampling from among all unmarried girls aged 20–30 living in Babol, Iran in 2022. The participants were screened using the Nomophobia Questionnaire (NMP-Q) and open-ended questions asked by the researcher. The data were collected through semi-structured interviews and participant observation. Data analysis was performed using Strauss and Corbin's (1998) approach until the data saturation point. ResultsThe data revealed 103 open codes, 24 axial codes, and 10 selective codes clustered into five main categories: Contextual conditions (family background and socio-economic conditions), causal conditions (individual and personality factors and individual's internal experiences from online interactions), intervening conditions (external facilitators and inhibitors), action and reaction (alternative strategies in social interactions), and consequences (attachment consequences, mobile loss consequences, and interactional consequences of online communication). ConclusionThis study identified five main categories of themes that can account for the process of nomophobia and understand how people with nomophobia interact socially. Following the developed model and the related factors, related professionals can make more accurate evaluations and then conduct more effective interventions with a focus on reducing and eliminating drivers and forces underlying, perpetuating, and reinforcing nomophobia and preventing and treating it based on individual characteristics of the affected people. Moreover, some suggestions were offered for further research and interventions in this field.